


Sons of the Father

by Merfilly



Category: Dragonriders of Pern - Anne McCaffrey
Genre: Community: smallfandomfest, Gen, Slice of Life, Vignette
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2009-05-30
Updated: 2009-05-30
Packaged: 2017-10-14 06:19:47
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,197
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/146289
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Merfilly/pseuds/Merfilly
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A set of scenes of the boys growing into their heritage</p>
            </blockquote>





	Sons of the Father

Fallarnon could hear his father and Manora talking in the other room. He knew he wasn't supposed to come up to his father's weyr, but he liked curling up next to Simanith to nap.

"...I am not asking anything from you, F'lon, as you should well know." Manora had a tone in her voice as Fallarnon tried to sneak into the passage leading to the dragon couch that sounded...irritated? His foster mother never got irritated.

"You can ask things of me, Manora...you've taken good care of me, of Larna's son." **That** note was nothing new to Fallarnon's ears. His mother died just past his birth, and his father still missed her.

 _So he does,_ Simanith rumbled. _He is turned away...move now._ Fallarnon rushed to the passage, heading down to napping against sun-warmed dragon hide.

"And none of that will change," Manora said patiently. "With luck, it will be a boy, so Fallarnon has a brother at his side."

//Brother?// was the curious thought, but then the precocious toddler was tucked in safe and sound beneath a dragon wing and he forgot anything but the warm, safe feeling.

`~`~`~`~`

"Come with me," Fallarnon challenged, his eyes glinting with mischief. Famanoran put his chin out fiercely at that tone, at the sheer trouble his elder half-brother was exuding. "What? Scared? Come on; don't be such a wherry-head!" the older boy challenged.

"I'm not scared. Nothing **you** can do would scare me," Famanoran told him staunchly. "But my legs still hurt from carrying black rock yesterday for you switching the spices when Manora was getting the roast ready." His mother was a firm hand on them both, but it sometimes felt like Fallarnon tried extra hard to get her to break patience with them both.

"We'll be back before she knows we were gone," Fallarnon coaxed. "Come on!" The younger boy could not ignore that tone, and he shifted up to a standing position despite the ache in his legs. Fallarnon led them both to the used glows, grabbed a couple, and then they were off, down the back corridors. Usually only the older boys went, but Fallarnon never left his half-brother out of things. This clutch...everyone said Fallarnon would stand, that he was the right age. Famanoran wasn't so sure a shot at the sands; he was the baby of the ones currently near close enough.

"Scared yet?" the older boy asked, as his glow flickered ominously.

"Are you?" Famanoran shot back.

They walked in quiet again until they got to the Hatching Grounds. Then, with a peak inside to be sure Nemorth was still out feeding or sunning, the two boys squeezed through the crack in the wall to get through to the still leathery looking eggs.

Famanoran lost all idea of being scared or keeping up with Fallarnon as he really took in the eggs and started mincing through the hot sands to actually see them close up. This was the closest he would come, he was certain. There was no promise Nemorth would clutch again while he was young enough to stand on the sands. But one of these, one that would be a bronze, would be his half-brother's dragon.

"Which one?" he asked softly, looking across at his brother's face, all adoration for his truest friend, the son of his father and the Weyrwoman before Jora.

Fallarnon surveyed them all, and shook his head. "I don't know...but I will ride, and so will you."

Famanoran didn't dampen his enthusiasm, but he really couldn't see a dragon in his future, as far apart as the clutches had been, and him still so young.

`~`~`~`~`

C'gan watched the two boys closely, noticing again that they worked apart from the other weyrlings more often than not. F'lar was forever volunteering his half-brother and himself for the more noxious duties, just so they would be alone. He wondered briefly if he should look into it, do something to force them to be sociable with the others.

The morning he caught the elder weyrling telling his half-brother the legends of Thread and about how Pass was coming, soon, he decided it was probably for the best; so few riders believed, and F'nor was still young enough to be dissuaded from the right path.

His worry over F'nor wavering if he were exposed to the others too much proved ill-founded. As Manora was treating the other weyrlings involved, C'gan took the young brown rider to one side. The boy had gotten into the fight, upsetting four dragonets in the process, because the other three boys had called F'lar a liar.

"But he's not. The Red Star is brighter this year than last," F'nor told C'gan. "So F'lar has to be right."

"The Teaching Songs all say Thread will Fall," C'gan pointed out. "But many think that because it did not Fall on time, it will not Fall at all."

"F'lar says it will, and I believe the son of my father."

That was, C'gan would learn over the following years, a good summation of F'nor.

`~`~`~`~`

"Next time," F'nor said, sitting up on the Butte with his half-brother in Keroon. Behind them, Canth and Mnementh were stretched full length out, wings out and draped, soaking up the sun, heedless of the chill wind blowing.

"Will there be a next time **in** time, son of my father?" F'lar demanded, punching one hand into the other, over and over in an uncharacteristic show of his emotions. F'nor knew his half-brother would not be this relaxed even if it had been just their wing with them; this was a private trust between them.

"Jora cannot keep Nemorth from mating forever," F'nor reasoned.

"R'gul will find a way to stop me. He's a sound dragonman, but his care for Pern is weak." F'lar shook his head. "No, we start with the wing. Convince them, make them understand...and they will lead when Thread falls."

F'nor looked at his half-brother, just nineteen turns to his sixteen and a half. He nodded, and threw his weight behind that goal.

`~`~`~`~`

F'lar could not have been more pleased at the situation if he tried. No girls of the right age in the Caverns. A golden egg shining between the rigid queen's claws. Jora dead. All three factors could be played into a decided advantage, and F'nor could see how intensely it was driving his half-brother.

"We Search?"

"Yes."

"Where?"

"In the lands of the man who killed our father," F'lar told him, a glint of emotion there. F'nor stared, curious as to the reasoning. As usual, F'lar explained. "He is hated...I hope to find someone of the right age and will with that hate, someone I can shape to be a strong leader."

"And it has nothing to do with the duel?"

F'lar snorted in disdain. "Fax may be a tyrant, but he is also aging. If he chooses to try and deter me..."

F'nor merely smiled at the unspoken words. He may have been the calmer of F'lon's sons, but he understood that F'lar had found the time to act...and he would be there to act with him.

`~`~`~`~`

….continued in **Dragonflight** by Anne McCaffrey....


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